OT:
"I've been pushing for *years* for someone to create a device that'd be able to capture digital video *and* a separate audio source simultaneously to the same video file, eliminating post-production sound synching nightmares that come with double system."

Well, this may sound like heresy, but firewire input would be nice for cameras without HDMI/SDI etc.

I know the thinking is that component out from the camera should give better (uncompressed) color than firewire m2t, but in reality I've heard a lot of conflicting comments along the lines that capture of component was softer than the firewire capture.

Could just have been a problem re the Blackmagic card, though.

If the component out is really as good as it should be, then component in to this box would be fine, I'm just not sure...

Regardless, having firewire even with all the m2t uglies would give a great option instead of Firestore, Nnovia etc since you could use your own hard drives.

Chris, that's a little too soon for us. But you could consider a "luggable" PC with an Intensity card unless the power cord is a big problem.

Jim, it's unlikely we'll support M2T files on this device. It's extra development effort and it's only a secondary feature as there are other M2T recording options. If you want M2T you can always record to HDV tape simultaneously with recording CineForm files.

Well, actually I don't want m2t, I want Cineform. I'd just like it if you'd do the conversion in the box from Firewire so I don't ever have to deal with m2t.

I'd be delighted to use the component route, just concerned that the result might be worse than what I would have gotten via Firewire, even with m2t in the middle.

I'd certainly hope that as a part of the development effort you could do some testing to compare the quality you're getting from component -> Cineform in the box vs Firewire -> HDLink -> Cineform and be sure that the component route gave the better quality.

Bottom line: Component out is great, and of course so much better than mpeg-compressed signal. (Disclaimer: at 35Mb/s, mpeg compression might be just fine, but that's not what we get from a $5K Sony cam.)

And, HDMI on V1U is still better than Component on Z1U. V1U outputs 4:2:2 color space over HDMI; Z1U only had 4:2:0 color space.

There were a couple of threads a couple of months back where someone had posted comparisons obtained from Component -> Blackmagic vs Firewire.

The Firewire capture looked much better - sharper and better color.

Now of course there are a zillion reasons why this might have been so:
Noise/interference on the cable, long cable run, bad cables/connectors, bad A-D in the Blackmagic card, bad D - A in the camera, etc etc etc.

But it did give me pause about using component to get better quality.

Hopefully the Cineform box will eliminate all the problems!

Regardless of all this, I have no doubt that I'll buy one of the Cineform boxes. It deserves to succeed. I might prefer not to have a display so it would be easier to velcro a couple of hard drives to it, though., like I do with my SD 702